Mall Rats

Despite the title of this blog, I am not really an adventurer. In fact, that was kind of why I named this blog “The Adventure.” In an effort to convince myself that I can, in fact, be spontaneous and fun. Do you know what makes that hard? Kids. And my personality. But darn it, I will continue to try.

Because Emma is…um….difficult…we don’t get out of the house much. I have mentioned before that she is not very portable on account of the projectile vomiting and screaming. But I’m starting to get a little stir crazy, and since she’s coming up on three months, I think that’s fair. So I’ve started to venture out, despite the fact I know she will most likely ruin it. This last week I made an attempt at spontaneity and adventure (well, at least compared to the last several months). I threw caution to the wind and went to the mall. One that we’d never been to before. I know, I know. Overachiever. My reasons for this mini-adventure were fourfold:

• It was 100 degrees out. We were in need of AC.
• We have to have pizza for lunch on Thursdays because that’s what the kids at preschool have. Since we leave right when they start having lunch, the only way to get Ben out the door is to guarantee pizza. So we have pizza on Thursdays. Normally I do a classy microwave one (like I’m going to order and entire pizza for just Ben and I…although I may or may not have done it once…), but this time I was getting all kinds of bold and brave.
• The mall we live across the street from is fancy and has no food-court. Pizza is beneath them.
• I’ve been trying to find a simple white sweater for Emma for winter-time, and none of the stores I frequent had one, which I find appalling. But I found one online at The Children’s Place, which upon discovering and perusing I decided I loved and wanted to try shopping there. Of course, our fancy mall doesn’t have one.

So I ventured forth from preschool to the “new” mall. It’s only 15 minutes from our house, so it may surprise you that we’ve never been. But when you live across the street from a mall, you’re hard-pressed to ever find a reason to go to a different one. But now I had four reasons. To further my adventure, I did not look up directions ahead of time. I figured that since you could see the mall from the freeway it would be a cinch. Right? Wrong. So wrong. Among many other wrongs. It took a fifteen minute drive through an iffy neighborhood to find it. In the meantime Emma was crying because she was overtired and had barely slept all day. Ben was crying because he’d made a craft at school that he had to leave there for display. But damn it, we were going to do this! By what can only be described as an act of God, the driveway I finally pulled into and parked in just happened to be the entrance to the food court, and The Children’s Place and the Disney store were right next to it. We got our fancy Sbarro pizza. But here’s what got my goat: the food court is surrounded by big-screen TVs playing music videos. So no matter where we sat, Ben was facing a big TV with music videos filled with disgusting lyrics and scantily clad girls with serious daddy issues. Ugh. It’s a MALL. There are KIDS here. And when did I become that woman who is disgusted with music videos?!?!?! Ben barely ate anything. The pizza was gross. But The Children’s Place had some great, cute, and cheap clothes (including a simple white sweater!) on sale, so score. I had to drag Ben out of the Disney store because we didn’t really have time (on account of my road trip to get there) and he wants the remote control McQueen so badly that he claims it is, in fact, his.

But we made it. We did something new. It wasn’t fun, but I can check it off my bucket list. The mall. Done.

Dancing with Daffodils

I had a moment this morning. I was driving to preschool, and suddenly I just felt awash with fullness. In a moment I felt full and at peace and at rest in my life. Not surprisingly, I was listening to Bon Iver. But suddenly I just felt…well, full. My life is full. And good.

The last few days have been challenging. We had a busy weekend, so maybe it was just that that caught up with Emma. I don’t know. But all the progress I feel like she’s been making seems to be out the window for a moment. It’s like she’s regressed a few weeks, and she’s taking us all down with her. At the end of last week she was sleeping well at night, happy during the day, napping well, and simply being unhappy and crabby during the evening hours instead of spending two hours wailing to Europe about how miserable she is. But the last few days she’s been napping terribly, waking up every hour at night, screaming through the evening, and being miserable throughout the day. Yesterday would have qualified for one of those terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad days. She threw up in the car on the way to school. All I had was a short-sleeved onesie to change her into. It was raining, and we were running a little late. So I had to park far away, change her in the backseat, and walk a fair distance in the rain with her in the baby equivalent of a bathing suit. Then all the way back. When we got home my neighbor had swiped our good parking spot, so I had to park a fair distance away and walk home…in the rain…with Emma half-naked and wailing. She took a handful of 45 minute naps throughout the day, which isn’t good. I had to wake her from her one good nap to pick Ben up from preschool, so she cried through the lunch hour. My mom and I took turns going outside and holding her while the other ate with Ben. She didn’t nap well after all that, so she cried off and on for a solid five hours in the afternoon/evening. Ben dropped a relatively heavy toy on her face, which didn’t make things any better. It was my night to get out of the house and take a break, and Matt called me after 30 minutes (as I was moments from ordering a soy mocha I’d been craving for a week) because Emma had been screaming herself into oblivion. So I came home, mocha-less. She refuses to bottle-feed, and every time I leave the house she screams the entire time, and usually projectile vomits. I’ve been handling things pretty well for a while—taking the bad in stride and trying to focus on the good moments, patiently waiting for them to outweigh the bad ones. But last night I hit a plateau. I felt crushed and defeated. It feels overwhelmingly like we’ve been in damage-control mode for far too long. Every day and night is spent trying to abate her misery enough to where we can function at a base level.

I’ve had a few things in the last couple of weeks—book club, a baby shower—and I haven’t brought her, much to everyone’s disappointment. Trying not to be all negative and complaining, I just say that it wouldn’t be much fun for anyone. Then I feel bad. I feel horrible that what I really feel is the fear of how bad she will be, that I don’t want to inflict that on anyone else, and that it would be impossible for me to enjoy any kind of social life with her in tow. So most of the time I just don’t even try. I don’t do anything. Because if I take her with me she is awful and it’s too stressful, and if I leave she just beats up whomever I leave her with and I feel guilty about that. So I do nothing. I stay home and hold my miserable little girl.

This last weekend we visited with some family that was here from out of town—with Emma. Matt and I spent the entire time trading her off and going outside with her while she cried and the other one of us tried to enjoy time with our family. At the end of the day, my sister-in-law said, “wow. She’s really high maintenance. She just needs a lot of care.” I know it sounds petty, but I think I really needed someone to say that. I needed someone to see just how hard life with her is, and to validate the difficulty. I shouldn’t need that, but if I’m honest, it was really nice to hear someone acknowledge it.
Of course through the challenge, I love her immensely. That’s what makes it so hard. I’m miserable seeing her miserable and feeling completely helpless. And selfishly, it destroys me to feel like I can’t take a break without her completely falling apart. Yes, I know that she’s okay, that it’s okay for her to cry, and that it’s healthy and necessary for me to take breaks to be a good mom, and that I can’t just never leave her. I know all that. But my mother’s heart just shatters, and my human heart just feels defeated. Obviously I need to take breaks, but obviously I can’t enjoy them knowing that my poor husband is punished every time I go out for a mocha. And his defeat is no less heart-wrenching, feeling like every time he cares for her she just cries.

Which brings us to this morning. Life with Emma is hard. Really really hard. But in that moment this morning, I was able to see past it. To think of soon sharing with her a first Halloween, a first Thanksgiving, a first Christmas…all those beautiful firsts. And to think of the other firsts—the joy I felt when she first rolled over, how proud and excited I am when she stands up and sits up and grins from ear to precious ear. It’s totally worth it. She’s worth it. One day she’ll get better. She’s already making her way there. All things considered, the good days now outnumber the bad. So I hold close mornings like this one. I savor the better moments and drink in those times when her real self comes through. Then when I’m holding her as she cries through dinner, I call back those sweet minutes and know that there will be more.

“And then my heart with pleasure fills/ and dances with the daffodils.”

V for Victory

All kinds of miracles and milestones happening in the last 24 hours in this house.

 

• 2-month check-up yesterday morning for Little E. At 10 pounds, 8 ounces and 22 inches she’s hanging around the 25th percentile, which is great for a GERDy baby.
• During her Hour of Power yesterday evening, Emma laid contentedly in her swing. Not crying. That’s right, folks. She did not cry her way through the 4-7 slot. Money.
• After a 10:30pm feeding at our bedtime, Emma only woke up once during the night to nurse. ONCE. And she skipped the 3:00-3:30 scream-fest altogether. Not a peep until 6:15am, at which point I gave her her pacifier and she dozed another 45 minutes. Hellooooo sleep.
• Emma’s not the only one hitting milestones. Benjamin wanted in on the action as well. This morning he had his first “I’m going to mortify my mom by saying completely inappropriate things because I’m little and have no idea what social boundaries are” moment. As we walked outside our front door our neighbor (who Ben sees just about every day) was passing by. Ben said, “He has a baby in his belly.” To which I awkwardly replied that only women can have babies in their bellies. To which Ben responded with, “He has a really big belly.” So our popularity in the neighborhood just kicked up a couple of notches.

 

But whatever, because Emma slept like a champ last night, and she’s been napping like a champ all day. Winning.

 

Other things that have happened since I got up yesterday morning: I ran over the largest screw on the planet pulling into Kaiser and had to get two new tires, Ben was up late last night coughing and puking, and Ben has been on a nap strike because he’s “scared of the dark.” At 2:00 in the afternoon.

 

Now here’s a random, un-related picture of my kiddos watching Thomas. Because people only look on this blog for pictures. (Side note: I don’t normally let Emma watch TV, I promise. I just put her next to Ben to take a picture, because it sounded fun.)

 

Pretty Family

A couple of months ago my friend Kara came over to visit. She is a budding hobby photographer, and she brought her camera to take a few shots of my very good-looking children. We hung out in the living room while Emma slept the whole time, so you only get to see Emma swaddled, and the only background is the living room. But you have to admit—Kara has a gift, and my children should be models (but I won’t let them be, because I just read the article on kids’ beauty pageants in People magazine and OH MY GOSH.)

Anyway, here are some of the good ones. This was during the week that I basically wore pajamas all day every day, so I’m not showing many of me. But you don’t want to see me anyway. You want to see these insanely beautiful children.

2 Months!

Our sweet little Emma is already 2 months old! Goodness.

She doesn't do much that's new, but she does get more and more smiley each day. I like that. I don't love that she cries continuously through every car ride and still gets up 3-5 times a night to nurse and cry...but it's not every night, so I'm hanging on to that thread of hope. Most days her reflux isn't much of an issue, which is really nice.  In all, she's a much happier baby than last month. We're all crazy nuts in love with her.

Happy 2 months, Emma!!!

I just want to eat her cheeks

Rapunzel vs. The Transformers

It's happened--my baby is a little BOY. I knew this day would come, but I was hoping I could delay it just a little.

Today at the bookstore, when it came time to pick a book, do you know what Ben wanted? It wasn't Clifford. Or Berenstein Bears. Or Little Critter. Or Curious George. It was Ironman. He has no idea who Ironman is, but he knows it has "bad guys" and "looks cool." When I said no, he picked Thor. When I said no to that, he picked Transformers. I was losing. Big time. I perused Transformers and decided that of all the choices, it was the least violent and inappropriate for a three-year-old. Then Matt saw a Halloween Backyardigans book. Ben was in. I was saved. For now.

Ben has a little cold, so we're having a movie night. We made hot chocolate, put on our jammies, and turned on Tangled, which we've never seen. Ben loves Pixar movies, and we've caught bits and pieces of this one at the doctor's office, and it was on Netflix instant. Two minutes in, Ben turns to me with the most piteous and terrified look I have ever seen. With a quivering chin, he sobbed, "can we watch Madagascar?" I asked what was the matter, and he sobbed that this movie was scary.

And he thinks he's ready for Transformers?